"I did not know ye were in my country, sir," says Robin.

"It sticks in my mind that I am in the country of my friends, the
Maclarens," says Alan.

"That's a kittle point," returned the other. "There may be two words to
say to that. But I think I will have heard that you are a man of your
sword?"

"Unless ye were born deaf, Mr. Macgregor, ye will have heard a good
deal more than that," says Alan. "I am not the only man who can draw
steel in Appin; and when my kinsman and captain, Ardshiel, had a talk
with a gentleman of your name, not so many years back, I could never
hear that the Macgregor had the best of it."

"Do you mean my father, sir?" says Robin.

"Well, I wouldnae wonder," says Alan. "The gentleman I have in my mind
had the ill-taste to clap Campbell to his name."

"My father was an old man," returned Robin. "The match was unequal. You
and me would make a better pair, sir."

"I was thinking that," said Alan.

I was half out of bed, and Duncan had been hanging at the elbow of these
fighting cocks, ready to intervene upon the least occasion. But when
that word was uttered, it was a case of now or never; and Duncan, with
something of a white face to be sure, thrust himself between.